


The many sides of Arya Stark

by JoannaBaratheon



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire, game of thrones
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-07
Updated: 2017-09-07
Packaged: 2018-12-25 03:06:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12026790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoannaBaratheon/pseuds/JoannaBaratheon
Summary: There were many men in Arya's life: those who loved her and feared for her. However there were fewer who understood her, though many thought they did.





	1. Ned

Arya terrified him.   
Whenever he looked at her he tried to separate his feelings towards her from the lingering pain from the last Stark girl who was too wild and free to ever be tamed. Lyanna was rewarded for her nature with death and he was determined for Arya to live differently. Of course there were subtle differences, for all Lyanna's unfemininity she had never been ostracised by her loved ones, she had grown up with three brothers who wouldn't dream of telling her to put down a sword. Arya on the other hand faced constant judgement from everyone around her. His wife, Arya's mother saw the girl's actions as some sort of defect that had to be corrected and subsequently passed this attitude on to Sansa.   
Part of Ned knew that no matter what Arya would never be a true Lady, but he still felt that it was his duty to make sure she lives a long life and escape her aunt's fate.   
He didn't want Arya to be like Lyanna. She must not.  
Ned would never see his daughter's journey, her path that led to her becoming not only Lyanna's ghost but so much more.


	2. Jon

If anyone knew Arya best then it had to be Jon. Whilst he had Robb and Theon as friends closer to his age, it was his little sister who was his closest companion. He had never been anyone's favourite up until the moment Arya had claimed him as her own. Jon was the one she would come to when she was upset, crying that Sansa was being cruel, unwilling to let anyone but him sees her pain. It was at times like this when he believed that he was the only one in Westeros who truly knew Arya. It wasn't that she didn't want to be a Lady, she tried, and if she was at all decent at sewing or dancing then she would be far more happy to do the ladylike activities. But she was too proud to admit her despair and turned her disappointment into anger and cries that she had absolutely desire to be a Lady. Looking at Arya Jon saw someone just like him: desperate to be accepted and loved for who they were. His search for acceptance took him to uncle Benjen and the Night's Watch, an although Arya would be heading south anyway, he knew that to her it was a betrayal. No longer would they bond in their roles as outcasts in the centre of the family.  
It would be many years before they reunited. The Night's Watch was no longer his family after his death. Arya returned still just as lost and searching for a home.


	3. Gendry

Gendry hadn't grown up alone. Literally though he was far from alone, the population of King's Landing meant that he was never truly alone.   
Gendry had grown up lonely. No mother or father to comfort him, and Tobho Mott, though a father figure, was far from a father.   
When he first saw Arya Stark he didn't think she was anything special, apart from the fact that she was a girl dressed as a boy. He allowed her to continue pretending for weeks before he revealed that he knew, which eventually resulting in discovering that the dirty little Arry was in fact a highborn lady. Though she constantly denied being a lady he soon saw that it was evident in everything she did. Her soft hands had never known physical labour as he had.  
Though thin, her body had never known crippling hunger as he had.  
In every way she was his opposite, the similarities seemed to end with the fact that both feared Lannister men. It took him a while to notice that in her loneliness she had been constantly drifting towards him, seeking out his company more than not. In her behaviour he noticed not just a girl who missed her family but a girl who was desperate for someone to like her for who she was. Later she would tell him that he reminded her of her brother Jon, the knowledge that he resembled her favourite person made him happy in a way he couldn't explain.   
If given the choice he would stay by her side for the rest of his life, he would even spend the rest of his life travelling on the roads as long as Arya was by his side, and they could be each other's family.  
But Gendry knew that she had a real family who would never allow him to be part of that family. So he decided to join the Brotherhood.   
They betrayed him.  
Arya wouldn't have


	4. Bran

As the three-eyed raven Bran could see everything that had been and what could be. Far north of the wall, possibly thousands of leagues from his closest family member it was natural that he would seek them out.  
Sansa was in the Vale, married and living as the noble Lady she had always dreamed of.  
Robb and Rickon were always out of his sight, he knew that they were dead, and the knowledge that their deaths would be avenged didn't stop him from grieving.  
Jon was Lord of Winterfell, King in the North, and finally home. But he was not happy. Watching Jon Bran could see a longing in his eyes, some nights he wouldn't sleep at all, staring out of his window in the hopes of seeing Arya ride into the courtyard.   
Unknown to Jon Arya had travelled further than the rest of the siblings combined. For years she remained in Braavos, training to get revenge on those who harmed their family. She constantly claimed to be no one, that Arya Stark no longer existed but her teachers could see that she lied, as he did.  
When he entire motivation was personal it was impossible for her to separate herself from the girl who looked so much like Jon, so much like their father, so much like the Aunt Lyanna Bran would see it his visions.   
Bran watched as she returned to Westeros and didn't hesitate is wiping out the Frey's. He knew that some would say she had a darkness in her, that she had become a monster.  
They were wrong.  
What monster dedicated their life to writing wrongs?  
What dark creature longed for nothing more than to live in peace with those she loved.   
He had seen those she loved and though there were not many, Bran knew that she loved them with all her heart.   
Jon: her everything, her other half, her life, hers.  
Gendry: her friend, her pack, her stupid stubborn bull, hers.  
Bran was no fool. He could see the parallels between the trio and another wolf, drag and dragon. In so many ways they were like their counterparts yet in so many ways they were better.   
Robert had been in love with the idea of Lyanna.  
Gendry was in love with everything Arya was.  
Rhaegar had been in love with the son that Lyanna could birth him.  
Jon was in love with what Arya didn't have to give him.  
He saw them reunite.  
He saw them love.  
He saw them live.  
He saw them die, years from now, happy


End file.
